Want to Know What's Really Going on? Ask a Comic
Of
course, satirists like Colbert, Dennis Miller, and Chris Rock have been
plying their politically charged trade on cable networks like Comedy
Central since the Clinton presidency, and the cynical irony for irony's
sake that Letterman has trafficked in for decades has been on life
support since George, Elaine, and Jerry Seinfeld waved farewell in
1998. Still, Letterman's clumsiness, not to mention Colbert's meteoric
rise and accompanying self-assuredness, signals that political satire
without a net is the new cool. (via Utne)
Borat a growing PR headache for Kazakhstan
Borat gives President Bush a reason to communicate with foreign leaders.
U.S. President George Bush is expected to meet the leader of Kazakhstan
Friday to discuss a range of topics -- possibly including a public
relations nightmare, caused by a fictional Kazakh reporter named Borat
Sagdiyev. (via CTV)
American Narcissism and Iraq
You see, no matter what happens in Iraq, it's mostly about us -- spelled U.S.; the United States. We're encouraged to perceive that Iraq is most important, at least implicitly, because of what it means for the USA: its image in other countries, the deaths and wounds of its soldiers, the political strength of the president and, this fall, the likely effects on the midterm congressional elections. (Via Counterpunch)
Economists’ statement supporting an increase in the minimum wage
In the, ain't-that-obvious department, leading economists are calling
for an increase in the, stuck-in-the-mud, minimum wage. You see, when
the minimum wage isn’t increased, and prices for goods keep rising,
people become poor, through no fault of their own.
The minimum wage has been an important part of our nation’s economy for
68 years. It is based on the principle of valuing work by establishing
an hourly wage floor beneath which employers cannot pay their workers.
In so doing, the minimum wage helps to equalize the imbalance in
bargaining power that low-wage workers face in the labor market. The
minimum wage is also an important tool in fighting poverty. (via Dollars and Sense)
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